Speed is significant in many ways, especially in the webspace. A website that loads slowly can affect your website traffic and ranking. Besides, a slow-loading site can drive away potential visitors. If your site does not load in two or three seconds, users will abandon your site, and some won’t even return. You surely don’t want that to happen, do you?
For increased revenue and improved traffic, your website must load faster. That said, most people get confused between website loading speed and server speed. Though both are co-related, there is still a difference.
Server speed is related to server response time. So, even if your server’s speed is good or the host offers excellent speed, your site might load slowly. Now, there are reasons why your site may be sluggish, such as unwanted plugins, heavy codes, unoptimised images, or bulk CSS and JavaScript.
If it is a site speed issue, you can optimise the speed using many tools. But, if it’s your hosting provider’s fault, you need to check the server speed of your website.
Read: 11 Actionable Ways to Speed Up WordPress Performance
A. What is Server Speed?
A server speed is a time that is calculated between a browser sending a request and getting a response back from the server. It generally depends on the location your site is hosted or the hosting company you choose.
Server speed indicates how fast the host will process your request to open a website. Though the host is primarily responsible for the server environment, the actual performance also depends on the user. Choosing the best host would ensure that you get the best server speed for your website.
B. How to check the server speed of your site?
You can check the server speed of your site by using a third-party application. Third-party apps give you an idea about the speed and performance of the site. There are some popular server speed checking tools like WebPageTest, Pingdom, and GTMetrix.
The tools work on algorithms across all locations to show you complete accuracy. However, these tools test your site as a whole and not only the speed.
With the results of the tool, you will need to extract the server speed data. But, the process is easy, and it won’t take much time. It is vital to use a tool with Google recommendations to get a performance-based result. An ideal server response time should be under 200ms.
C. The Process – How it Works
You can use a speed-testing tool and enter your site URL.
- The tool or website will show you results from ten different locations across the globe
- Once the process is over, you’ll get results with the performance grade. If you get A+ or A, it means it is within Google’s recommended range.
- If the site response time is B or low, it’s time to switch to a new host.
- For getting A and A+ results, you can trust branded web hosting companies like Bluehost, HostGator and A2 Hosting.
D. Two Signs of Slow Web Hosting Server
Though there are many factors responsible for slow web hosting servers, Time to first byte and Distribution of components are two primary factors for under-performing web hosting servers. If your dynamic web pages load slower than static pages, you’ll need to evaluate these two factors.
i. Time to the first byte
The metric defines the duration between the end-to-end browsers sending the HTTPS request to receive the first byte from the requested data packet. However, some definitions may outline this as the duration after the browser performs the DNS lookup. The connection time plays a significant role in the component, which affects the server speed.
Moreover, external factors such as internet network connection speed play a vital part in TTFB metrics. After this, it shouldn’t be more than 0.5 seconds. In fact, the time has changed now, and the latest infrastructure and backend elements allow the TTFB to be around O.1 seconds.
ii. Distribution of web page components
The distribution of web page components also affects the server speed. When dealing with the server issue, you’ll notice non-cache site features evenly distributed component load times.
But this can be misleading unless the TTFB is low. Most websites have server issues that indicate errors while accessing the webpage cached by the end-user. Here, you will notice that the TTFB duration is much longer than it should be.
In some cases, it’s the last component that is responsible for more than 60% of site latency. The only way you can find about this is through a complete webserver speed test.
E. Optimal Testing Parameters
You will require three main testing parameters when you check the web server speed.
- User name and password, which will help you verify the website.
- GET or post parameter, which lets you know about the name and value.
- Headers, which lets you know about the name and value.
Once the test is complete, you’ll get:
- Monitoring time
- Status
- Duration
- Error code
- Error description
Wrapping up,
Server speed and website loading speed are two vital factors that affect the overall performance of the site. You can optimise your website speed by optimising the images, JavaScript, CSS, and disabling irrelevant plugins.
For improving the server speed, it’s essential to check the speed using different tools. Once you know the error, you can change your host or find a possible solution. Paying attention to speed should be your primary focus as Google considers high-speed optimised websites a priority in ranking.
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